Polly Smith – Special Friend program

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When I first started this position, I heard about the special friend program. I came in August, and in the middle of September and early October, the special friends arrived. During the interview process I had been here to visit, and had seen the classrooms filled with grownups. My feeling was, that there were so many people here, that it was hard for teachers to know who was doing what. In just the observations I made in the interview process, I wondered about whether children were falling through the cracks because the presence of so many adults was requiring adult-to-adult contact that took the teachers away from focusing on the children. Beginning last October, when I began to see what happened when the special friends came, I stood back and watched, it took me about four months before I began to say there is something to this. [01:58:00] And then as I watched the bonds develop between the children and the special friends, learned their individual stories of relationships, and the power of those relationships that had gone on. Parents started to tell me about older siblings' special friends that were still part of their family, correspondence over email or letters, I became a true convert. I now believe that it is one of the strongest things that the school does, and that the school really moves mountains in order to make this happen. Everyone is devoted to it, and I am too. The joy on the children's faces, the power of attachment, the sense of this is somebody who cares about me, but it becomes extremely reciprocal, and the child cares about the adult as well. There are rules about not babysitting for your special friend, or not baby sitting at all for any of the children, this is a very special, very revered time that is honored, a relationship that is honored within the context of the school, and based in the idea of child choice. So the child decides what he or she will do with their special friend, the child takes the lead, and really creates, and the special friend follows, and a very beautiful relationship develops, that is really derived by the children's interest, and their personalities. I think they feel that very powerfully within them. I have seen it work magic for children, [02:00:00] that you would never imagine needed anybody more in their life. With doting grandparents, and very attentive parents, older siblings, or ant and uncles, great extended family, very jolly and happy. You would think, another person? I don't think so. Completely devoted to their special friend. I've also seen it be extremely powerful for children for whom having another caring adult in their life, you would say, as an educator, this could be a good thing.

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